New brain gene gives us edge over apes

November 15, 2012

(Credit: Ross Hawkes/Flickr)

An international team led by the University of Edinburgh has discovered a new gene called miR-941 that helps explain how humans evolved evolved from apes by playing a crucial role in human brain development, and may shed light on how we learned to use tools and language.

The researchers say it is the first time that a new gene — carried only by humans and not by apes — has been shown to have a specific function within the human body. They compared the human genome to 11 other species of mammals, including chimpanzees, gorillas, mouse and rat, to find the differences between them.

The results showed that the gene — miR-941 — is unique to humans. The researchers say it emerged between six and one million years ago, after humans had evolved from apes.

The gene is highly active in two areas of the brain that control our decision making and language abilities. The study suggests it could have a role in the advanced brain functions that make us human.

It is known that most differences between species occur as a result of changes to existing genes, or the duplication and deletion of genes.

But scientists say this gene emerged fully functional out of non-coding genetic material, previously termed “junk DNA,” in a startlingly brief interval of evolutionary time. Until now, it has been remarkably difficult to see this process in action.

Researcher Dr. Martin Taylor, who led the study at the Institute of Genetics and Molecular Medicine at the University of Edinburgh, said the results were significant. ”As a species, humans are wonderfully inventive — we are socially and technologically evolving all the time. But this research shows that we are innovating at a genetic level too.

“This new molecule sprang from nowhere at a time when our species was undergoing dramatic changes: living longer, walking upright, learning how to use tools and how to communicate. We’re now hopeful that we will find more new genes that help show what makes us human.”

The team worked with scientists in China and Germany. The study was funded by the National Natural Science Foundation of China and the Medical Research Council.

Comments (24)

Please don’t say ‘humans evolved FROM apes.’. This gives ammunition to uneducated creationists. Actually, humans are one species of great ape and evolved alongside the other current species. I’m from Oklahoma, where there’s no shortage of scientific ignorance.

#1. Humans had stone tools for thousands and thousands of years….even native american Indians were using the same basic stone tools just several hundreds of years ago…and they are surprisingly similar to the stone tools we find that were so much older. Why did stone tools stay in use so long? Was organized war what forced development of metals and other tools to go beyond stone tools…. Were stone tools “good enough” that left users with a why bother making anything else more advanced for so long, or were we missing the overachiever gene until very recently? Minor differences in stone tools spanning the entire globe for so very long… why was this development beyond stone tools so slow?

#2 I find it amazing that if you count up every living type of creature to ever grace the earth there is only modern day humans that have been able to use a written language, where knowledge can be passed forward to advance future generations. Yeah insects can leave chemical signals behind that must be able to be read by future generations and there must be genes within a baby deer that teaches it to stand, then walk, then run and then even hide to survive in the first 24 hours of life…so some info is passed on to assist the future…but you would think that as an evolutionary concept that passing on knowledge to the future generations to advance it would be a valuable gene for EVERY species and that we would find more species that used tools, or had an opposable thumb http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thumb#Other_animals_with_opposable_digits, or used language, or created written languages or just had an overachiever gene, vs. the good enough gene, or the wait for total disaster, then start to prepare gene.

so…are we just some stroke of luck along the evolutionary path, or is it only a matter of time and enough RNA soup and mixing that this good idea of written language gets created and technology sparks…and intelligent life that wants to build a radio tower eventually then forms?

it would be interesting to see what happens when they turn off that gene (RNAi stuff) or turn it on for creatures that don’t have it now…..but my guess is that there are a lot more genes involved that are critical than just this one….

I think that early development simply takes a long time to get past and this is true in almost every situation. Also, other major developments must proceed before rapid developments can occur. Spoken language, written language, the ability to collaborate and share knowledge. The ancient Greeks and Romans both had a number of impressive inventions and ideas. However many didn’t spread quickly or easily as the inventors probably wanted to keep them as defensive measures against ‘enemies’ or use them as an advantage against others. Then there are events where there are potential slide backs. How much did we lose when the Roman Empire fell and the Library of Alexandria was destroyed? How much can be learned and how quickly when only one book is considered acceptable? If you look at history, at least what we know of it, the development of additional technologies and knowledge was rather slow and plodding. With the advent of the printing press and the Reinassance we saw a trend upward in development. More people able to share ideas and more able to be exposed to them with additional written materials. Compared to early history our current developments are moving at breakneck speeds because of the tools and processes we’ve built upon as well as because we have incentives to share many of the ideas that have been created on a wide scale. So no, I really don’t find it all that surprising that it took so long for cultures to move beyond certain ranges of knowledge.

I also don’t think we are so alone on the intelligence scale. Greater apes are able to learn sign language and communicate with us. Dolphins and whales are considered extremely intelligent, almost certainly more intelligent than some people I’ve seen on TV, and there are groups that have shown that the squeaks and whistles of dolphins do in fact qualify as language. Ravens have shown that they are avid tool users, finding appropriate items to handle there needs. Theres even a video showing one with a thin strip of wood using it to ‘snowboard’ down the roof of a house with snow on top. And these are just a few examples. They may not be as intelligent or capable as we are but we seem to have a collection of advantages put together that others don’t. We have a developed vocal structure for advanced communication. We have dextrous hands for the creation of tools, manipulation of materials, or writing. Add that in with our mental capacity and we have a package of abilities that makes it easier for us to have achieved what we have today. Were we able to find a way to overcome the barriers that other species have we might be able to rapidly uplift them to a level comparable to our own.

Finally, I feel too many try to make assumptions about the possibility of intelligent alien life. In all probability if they are moving about the galaxy or universe easily, they aren’t using radio waves for communication. It would be like us shouting to communicate with people thousands of miles away. Heck, any suitably advanced life could be watching us and waiting for us to evolve to a level where we are worth communicating with, using technology we can’t comprehend to be hidden in plain sight. As for spotting the activities of alien life, well, we can barely pick out nearby planets and don’t have the ability to even map out all the stars (red dwarfs and such) in our own galaxy, let alone the universe. It could be any suitaby advanced alien intelligence would be unobservable by us with current technology. It could also be that aliens closer to our own scale are spread out in a way that would make them unobservable to us. There are currently too many potential ways of thinking about this and little to no real way to get suitable information with our current tech. Maybe if we hit the singularity we may be able to change this, perhaps we’ll be invited into a greater community of intelligences that was simply waiting for us to evolve. Who knows. All I know is we can’t be too sure of anything at that scale with what little we know right now.

gator, Like #1,
comes back to the neural Big Bang argument. A good one with opposing reasonable support.
I always said that humans took 3myrs to figure out something better than a chipped stone. Then Thursday they invented the internet.
I am currrently interested that it is now believed that Neanderthals did not have “theory of mind.” which should mean that Cro Magnon (us) are the first primates with “theory of mind” (we evolved from a common ancestor heidelbergensis).

Well scientists better come up with a new and improved brain gene soon as majority of humans seem to be rapidly devolving back to apes. Maybe that’s a good thing, the A.I. enhanced community behind large walls, the rest of humans back to nature, violent and irrational as they have always been, and with current genes, always will be, but happily screwing every five minutes like…apes. Hmm, might want to take a vacation to the other side from time to time though…. ;)

Not likely since there is currently no direct link between the two Species: Humans and Apes. This new gene helps to prove that they are distinct (along with the obvious differences). Otherwise we would have, now, alive on Earth an ape who had this gene but wasn’t fully developed – in other words – partway between Human & Ape. How is it that this gene just ‘appeared’ to produce Humans? Mutant genes generally don’t have a positive impact on ‘evolution’ only a negative impact, which leads to devolution or at the least the ‘status quo’, which we appear to have now. There are currently no ‘transitional species’ on Earth (Fossil or Living) which you would expect to see if one Species were evolving from one to another, more advanced or at least different Species, such as Ape to Human. Remember, the record shows that Humans just seemed to appear several hundred thousand years ago, more or less as we exist today (DNA tracking seems to have demonstrated and confirmed this with theoretical Eve – If true, who were Eve’s parents? & Did they have the Brain Gene or did it just appear in her?). If we were ‘evolving’ shouldn’t this process have taken several million years to happen rather than only a few hundred thousand years? I don’t believe in ANY religious views on this matter, but there are a lot of unanswered questions that discoveries like this one raise re the history of Humans. Think about it, what if we did inject the Brain gene into Apes as an experiment and subsequent offspring did become more intelligent over time. This has other ramifications for the future of genetic manipulation. If we do it and it works, we could actually mold modern Apes into a new Species, designed by us. It may take a 100 years or more, but we could likely speed up the process through future genetic research, should we decide to actually try it…….. This would suggest at least the possibility of the Planet of the Apes scenario sometime in the future! REMEMBER – Science! – Keep asking lots of questions! Food for Thought! Enjoy!

Given that our understanding of evolution is no where near complete and add in that our knowledge of history beyond a relatively short time period, relatively speaking, is laughable, it would seem that such a process is possible. The fact that the numbers of human, or protohuman, peoples at the time were almost certainly limited, if a beneficial gene for intelligence was to appear in even a single instance it would be a dramatic benefit and thus quickly spread through the rest of the population over a few generations and within a few hundred years most living examples of the species would most likely have it. For example they believe that the trait for blue eyes is only about 6000 years old or so but there are a vast number of people with blue eyes and even more that carry the recessive trait so that future offspring may display it. Given that this intelligence trait appeared a much greater period back into the past it could have taken millenia to propagate and it would still be difficult for us to pinpoint with what exists from that time period for us to review and examine.

“The gene is highly active in two areas of the brain that control our decision making and language abilities.”

This could give you a talking dog. Very useful for the military and the police. It could tell you that there is a bomb under the road, or heroine in the parking lot at the airport.

But on the other hand, if my dogs could talk, they would always be begging for unhealthy foods, such as chocolate, or nagging me for extra walkies. OOPS! I’m already five minutes late giving them their 11:30 a.m. walk.

Their vocal apparatus would still be insufficient and although I don’t think you could make a canine Nietzsche in one go (considering how long it took humans to) this COULD frustrate it enough to make a suicidal one. Maybe not AS suicidal as nagging for unhealthy food =) though domestication do produce a dysfunctional animal compared to wild type.
This gives me a great idea. I hereby propose a new Turing Test. When AI starts genuinely nag for unhealthy food, then it probably arrived at human level “intelligence”

They don’t need that much modification. My German shepherd, Rudy, once got out and was picked up by Animal Control. When I came to get him out of the pound he was so glad to see me he cried and said, “I love you.”

OMG George Bush is herre to. What a genius, responsible for 911 without leaving a trace, fixing Florida election in Democratic districts, no trace. responsible for world economic collapse while another is President.